Do our pass routes change during the play?Posted by wdhalgren on 11/6/19 at 1:41 pm

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I noticed a couple of plays during the Florida game where their DB blitzed but our pass route didn't change to take advantage of the open area and/or maybe get the receiver open sooner. I don't know how easy that is to do on the fly, but here are the plays I'm talking about.

On this play, the safety blitzes leaving the middle of the field open, but Robertson cuts outside instead of slanting across the middle area vacated by the safety. Looked like he'd have been immediately open if he cut inside since the coverage was 7 or 8 yards off and to his outside shoulder.

On this play, the cornerback blitzes, leaving safety coverage over Blaylock. Blaylock does an inside move before reversing and cutting outside, which gives the blitzing corner time to reach Fromm and gives the deeper safety time to close on Blaylock. This one happened fast so I'm not sure Blaylock recognized that it was a blitz.

That's kind of what I figured. I think Fromm could handle that but not sure which receivers are ready to do it. The play with Robertson definitely looks like it could have worked out well if he'd changed his route.

re: Do our pass routes change during the play?Posted by Peter Buck on 11/7/19 at 9:38 am to AlaCowboy

One thing Spurrier did a good job of pioneering at the college level was teaching route reads based on defenses. He killed our zone and we had issues keeping up with them in man. A lot of routes you see are based on defense. Some routes settle in soft spots. Some are meant to clear out a zone. It can be pretty complex at times. In general, if you see an INT thrown directly to a defender, it could very likely be that the QB correctly or incorrectly assumed the receiver was going to be moving to a spot in front of the defender. Not only could the routes change on coverage, blitzes in some cases call for adjustment. That has filtered down from the NFL as well. Of course, sometimes, it could just be a player not seeing/hearing the play correctly. It’s pretty difficult for us as fans to know what really went wrong when a route appears to not have been run correctly. Though overall, experience and continuity will make most receivers and QBs better at this facet as they mature. Each week, game planning adds new wrinkles based on the team you are playing, so it is really a constant learning process.

UGA has a lot of option routes, I believe. While a Fromm has had some outright misses, more than a few of his bigger "mistakes" have been in situations where the young receiver made the wrong read.

Offensive staff has to make sure these young guys get up to speed faster than they have been. There's nothing worse for this team than leaving the more talented receivers on the bench because they're not yet able to effectively execute. Gotta coach them up faster.

The Hooper play and the Cager play were designed to get all of the action flowing right on the bootleg and have the receiver (TE in Hooper's case) on the right side of the LOS sneak out and run a wheel route up the left sideline.

Hooper and Cager lined up in the same spot and ran the same route. If that play is set up and executed correctly, it's almost impossible to cover. It takes incredible eye discipline by the defense or superhuman recovery speed by the free safety.